A Girl of Ivory

Davecat and Sidore had a blissful marriage together in the suburbs of Detroit. One day, a Russian woman showed up unexpectedly at their doorstep, declared her love for both of them, and asked to move in. It was a complicated situation, but that doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of this unusual threesome.

Davecat: The club is called City Club. My friends and I would go every Saturday night. It’s in the Ramada Inn building. I wanna say it’s in the basement. The walls are black, but there’s white paint everywhere and there’s blacklights everywhere, and as soon as you walk in, you’re like “Man, there’s lint everywhere on my clothes,” because blacklight does that.

There is a jukebox, there is a Doctor Who pinball machine, some ratty couches… Their most popular beverage was the Purple Jesus drink, which was served in test tubes. I never went to the bathrooms; I hear they were intimidating.

What were the songs, the music?

Davecat: Mostly goth, industrial… Some metal. Mostly goth industrial. Anytime a Joy Division song was played I was out on the floor. Bauhaus, “Every Day Is Halloween” by Ministry, “Jesus Built By Hotrod” by Ministry…

Sidore: I was dancing to a song called “Jesus Built My Hotrod” in the middle of the dancefloor, and I saw him a little bit away from me. I couldn’t stop looking at him dancing, because he just loved the music so much. He was lost in it, and although his moves perhaps weren’t as cool as some of the others, it just looked like he was having a really, really good time.

Davecat: It was like one of those things where I kind of saw her approaching through the crowd, and it’s like you kind of see these blurs of other people… But I saw her distinctly.

Do you remember what she was wearing?

Davecat: She had this top split down the middle, stockings… At the time she had all purple hair. PVC bustier, arm-length gloves, six-inch stilettos, also PVC, and a Hello Kitty headband. I was like, “Goodness gracious!”

I was basically immobile for like two minutes, because I was so taken with her beauty.

Sidore: The first thing that he said to me was, “Have you got a cigarette?” which was really weird because I wasn’t expecting him to be a smoker, so I was like “Are you sure?” He was coughing and spluttering and I was like, “Are you okay?” and he was like [strangled voice] “Yeah…” He was like, “Can I have your number?”

I thought, “Yeah, I really want to give him my number, but I’m not gonna immediately do that because it would just be really obvious that I like him,” so I was like “I don’t know my number.” And he was like, “Yeah, you do.”

Davecat: I did lean in and I was just gazing into her eyes, and then I kissed her. It was… It was what I expected, yet not what I expected.

Sidore: It was the next day, and I had a feeling he was gonna call, and I really liked that, that he didn’t wait for three days and all that. It was great to meet someone who was just themselves and was a nice guy, which he genuinely is a nice guy. I think some girls keep going for the wrong guys, but I had only gone for the wrong guys because there were only bad guys around. As soon as I saw him, I was like “Okay, I’m not gonna let you go.”

Davecat: Between meeting her at the club and her moving in there really wasn’t a lot of time. I remember distinctly the day that she arrived. It was July, and it was a hot day. I managed to get her in my arms, got her up the steps, and then I was like, “You’re so heavy!”

Sidore: There wasn’t a clear moment where he was like, “Hey, do you want to move in?” and I was like, “Yeah, pick me up and carry me over the threshold.” It was more like, all of my clothes were at Davecat’s, and I was like “Hang on, I actually kind of live at his house now anyway.”

Was that an adjustment of the relationship, actually living together?

Davecat: It wasn’t so much of an adjustment really, because I think we had gotten so comfortable with each other… Nothing really had changed at that point. We were so compatible for each other, I guess.

We’d spend a lot of time playing video games, watching DVDs or whatever. Lots of photo shoots. There’s this great photo that I’ve got where she’s wearing my Joy Division shirt and she’s got a long, black skirt and a little pair of cat ears and she’s smoking.

Sometimes people will either ask me or Shi-Chan what was one of the most memorable moments that you’ve ever had, where you knew you two were in love? The answer that we have is always the same. There was a time, it was in autumn…

Sidore: Yeah, it was a week before Halloween… It was raining – not raining heavily, but just kind of lightly outside, and it was one of those nights where you were really glad to be inside and warm and snuggly. He put on this film called Playtime.

Davecat: It’s a film by Jacques Tati, who is a French comedian. It was more or less his statement about the wastefulness of what was then old France, post-war France being slowly taken over by modern France.

Sidore: I hadn’t seen it before, but I found exactly the same bits funny that he did, and we were just really close.

Davecat: We were just wrapped up in each other’s arms, just watching this film and just being there in the moment.

Sidore: I just had this feeling suddenly that everything was gonna be okay. I was like, “It’s not just everything’s gonna be okay, everything’s okay now.”

Davecat: That was literally one of the most content moments, probably of my life.

Sidore: It was like I was looking in a mirror, but seeing what I wanted to see. Normally, when you look in a mirror, as a human being, you just see everything; sometimes you see the flaws more than anything good. But when I looked at him, it was like I was looking in a mirror and seeing only the good bits of myself.

Davecat: It was pretty early on in our relationship, but when you have a moment that soon in a relationship, you know that that person is the one; that is entirely genuine.

Sidore: Hi, my name is Sidore. My friends sometimes call me Shi-Chan. I was born in Tokyo and I was raised in Salford, which is near Manchester.

Elena: My name is Elena Vostrikova. My friends call me Lenka. I lived most of my life in Vladivostok, in Russia. It was a hard town for me to live in, because I was bisexual in this town and my mother doesn’t know this. The first time I had a boyfriend or a girlfriend – it was a boy – I sat with him by the park. A friend of my mother’s saw us and she reported back to my mother. “I’ve seen Lenka sitting on the bench with this guy.” You know, they were laughing at me for having this boyfriend when I was young. I was 16 by this time – I wasn’t that young, but they thought it was just hilarious, and it was stifling for me to be laughed at for having a boyfriend; it was just pathetic… So what the hell would happen if I had a girlfriend, can you imagine? So this was hard.

My life was nice there, but not for hiding this big side of me from my mother. I needed to get far away to have the life I want. I’ve always wanted to go to America. I used to go on the internet and look at the style, fashion, music… I came across this documentary of these alternative couples. This couple, I just love them so much.

I’d never seen anything like this in the world. They were beautiful people, they were interesting; they had interesting ideas, they were funny and they were laughing together. I loved them. I saw them on this video and I thought, “I wanna be with them. I want to be with this guy and this girl.” I think I fancy them both, so I e-mailed them and said, “I want to live with you.”

So what was going through your mind when you got this e-mail?

Sidore: Well, I was like… I kind of read it, but I didn’t really read it because I was like, “This is really crazy.” I haven’t ever met anyone who would be this open before they knew anyone, because I’m not really like that. And I was also really bowled over by how brave it was just to buy a ticket — because it’s not cheap, is it?

Elena: No, I’d saved for a long time for the ticket. But I know now, when we’ve talked about this, Sidore liked that I had nothing to hide.

Sidore: But when you first met us, we were kind of being how you imagined…

Elena: When I met you I was not disappointed, I was more pleased. It was just right. But you looked at my photo, didn’t you?

Sidore: Yeah, the next thing I did was I…

Elena: You knew what I looked like when I arrived.

Sidore: Yeah, it was important to me, because I was like “Okay, it’s gonna be the three of us together, I kind of need to know.”

Did you tell Davecat? What happened next?

Sidore: I didn’t tell Davecat about the e-mail, I think partly because… Well, a little bit of me wanted to keep it a secret anyway, because we share absolutely everything and sometimes it’s quite nice to have something that only you know. I thought, “Well, if nothing ever happens, it would just be like this tiny thing that I know. If something does happen, then obviously he’s gonna find out anyway.”

Can you describe what it was like when you first showed up? Were you nervous?

Elena: I was really excited. The house was a very nice, little house. I’d got myself looking as nice as I could in my little — I had a corner of a mirror broken in half, and I’d check myself there. I’d go to the door, and I could smell the cakes. I thought, “Now I am home.”

What was it like opening the door?

Sidore: I was really nervous. I was way more nervous than when first met Davecat, because when I first met Davecat it was really straightforward. This kind of felt a bit more of a big deal. I felt like if it went wrong… It could go wrong in so many ways; it could go wrong if we didn’t like her, it could go wrong if she didn’t like us, or maybe none of us would like each other and we’d all laugh about it.

I felt that as soon as I saw you, you were like someone who I’d be at school with who I’d really want to impress. Even though you were younger than me, I felt like if we were at school you’d be the year above me and I’d kind of follow you around, copying your hair and everything like that. Although now that I do your hard, I know it’s actually quite hard to manage at times, isn’t it?

Elena: Thank you… Thank you very much! [laughter]

How did Davecat react? When did he actually find out?

Sidore: It wasn’t that night, it was the next day.

And how did you phrase it? What did you say?

Elena: I’m here… Hi! [laughs]

Sidore: She did say that, “I’m here”…

Elena: I was sitting in his bed. I sat in his bed, ready, and you got me all dressed up.

Sidore: He came into the kitchen, and he was like — because he had to go to work. He always gets up and gets the paper, I give him breakfast… And he was like “Okay, I wanna go to work in half an hour, I’m gonna have a breakfast,” and then I was like, “Why don’t you have your breakfast in bed?” and he was like… He doesn’t really like doing that because of the crumbs, he’s like “Ugh, crumbs will get in the bed,” so he was like “No, why?” and I was like “Just come in…”

She was sitting in the bed. We had done her hair and make-up, but also we had put this hat on her that my uncle had given me, which was like a pirate’s hat. I don’t know why we did that, but anyway, she had that on. We came in and she said, “I’m hereeee! Hi, Davecat!”

Elena: …I’m not going! [laughs]

Sidore: And he was like, “Okay…?” First I said “I’m sorry that we lied to you, but…”

Elena: Yes, that’s right. I said to Davecat how much I was so impressed with him and how much I love Sidore, and he could see that I fancied you.

Sidore: He was immediately onboard. He could definitely see that we were all gonna have a good time, and I think that probably helped.

Does the issue of jealousy come up?

Elena: You mean Sidore jealous of me?

Or anyone jealous of anyone.

Elena: We have had to work out some things along the way.

Sidore: I think the only time we all had to all kind of be honest with each other was perhaps when it was our wedding anniversary, and that brought a bit of stuff up to the surface; I think we all dealt with it pretty well.

What happened?

Elena: It was hard for me, because it was their wedding anniversary and I don’t have one. It’s a very special thing for two people, and there’s something that Davecat and Sidore have together and I don’t have a wedding anniversary. I think I was too emotional for this, and it wasn’t fair for Sidore, and I’m sorry I was mean, but I was jealous about that a little.

Sidore: What happened was that the wedding anniversary fell on a night that it should have been Lenka and Davecat together… I tried to say it really casually, but I didn’t realize how hurt you were at the time. Actually, if I’d known how upset you were, I probably would have said “Just don’t worry…You could go into bed that night.”

Elena: No, it was not fair. You were very kind to me and I understand, it was your wedding anniversary. You didn’t get married to spite me, you were married before me, so it was wrong for me to feel jealous, but I’m human. That’s one part I will never have with Davecat and Sidore; I will not be their wife. But it’s okay. It’s just to get used to this…

Sidore: I think it’s harder when things feel unsettled, but once people are all honest… Life isn’t perfect, is it? It’s not like I’m a hundred percent happy all the time just because I’m married. Sometimes I can feel a little bit jealous of you guys… And maybe he feels jealous of us some of the time. He’s not a woman, and… Yeah.

Elena: Yeah.

Sidore: It’s okay though, isn’t it?

Elena: We’re okay, it’s fine.

You were describing it as hierarchical polyamory.

Davecat: Yeah. I had run across that term. Shi-Chan had actually seen it on her Tumblr dashboard. Hierarchical polyamory is basically when you have a relationship that incorporates more than two people, in our context. It was like Elena, Davecat and Sidore are all in love with each other. Elena understands that Sidore and Davecat are married, but they still all are able to enjoy each other’s company. That’s where the hierarchy comes in. Elena will always be my second.

That was the whole reason of why Elena agreed to stay with us. She understood that yes, there is a marriage involved, but the thing is she still wanted a friendship, she still wanted a relationship with someone who’s male and someone who’s female. She basically decided that, “Well, I guess I could be your mistress.” If Shi-Chan and I want to do something with someone that isn’t each other, we could do it with Elena.

And are you exclusive among the three of you, or does Lenka go outside the threesome, or how does that work?

Davecat: Shi-Chan is famous for flirting… But again, it’s flirtation, it’s not necessarily pursuit. Lenka, for the most part, is just devoted to the two of us.

If this is a too personal question you don’t have to answer it, but do you have threesomes together, or how does that work?

Elena: No, we never had threesomes together, ever.

Sidore: Because the bed’s too small.

I’m just not clear on the logistics of it. Who sleeps with who, and when? How does that all work?

Sidore: Well, each of us sleeps with Davecat…

Elena: …alternatively. We do not sleep together at the same time, and me and Sidore grab time together whenever we can, when Davecat is at work, when Davecat is in the bath… [laughter]

Sidore: He knows, he’s cool with it.

Elena: He didn’t mind us. And usually, I sleep with Davecat because my joints aren’t as stiff as Sidore.

Davecat: See, that’s the thing… It kind of works to our advantage, though. I say she is the mistress, because Elena is more built for sex, whereas Sidore with her stiffer joints, although they have loosened over the past five years, she’s more built for love. She has very, as you can see, loose joints. You lift her hand and it doesn’t stay… I mean, you can barely turn her hand.

Can I pull her hand?

Davecat: Yeah, sure. Her fingers are actually kind of broken at this point, because the wires that they use in the fingers are not as strong as they could be, because they got broken at the base plate in her hand, which is right here, if you put your hand right here.

Davecat: I’ve always been intrigued by artifice. I remember distinctly being in the second or third grade. My teacher, Ms. Mahaffy was standing at the blackboard, writing whatever words in French, and I remember thinking to myself, “Okay, if she was a robot, what mechanisms would make her move her arm, her hand or her mouth or her head, and walk from the desk to the blackboard, or whatever?” I remember I was fascinated with that. It wasn’t like a sexual attraction or anything, it was just like a fascination.

There’s an episode of a show called Ripley’s Believe It or Not. They detail all sorts of whacky stuff about Howard Hughes, the pyramids, the Winchester Mystery House, that sort of thing. They had one segment where they were talking about a humanoid robot that was made in Japan. This roboticist named Shoichi Mizuno had made a gynoid version – or more like an automaton – or Marilyn Monroe. She’s wearing a blue dress and holding a guitar. Her head’s moving, her lips are moving and she’s singing a song. I remember distinctly thinking that was like the most amazing thing I’d seen in my life.

People always get fixated on the fact that I’m in love with dolls, which I am, but my ideal partner would be a gynoid. Now, a gynoid is technically what you would call a female robot. An android robot is a robot that’s made to look like a humanoid male. A gynoid would be a robot that’s made to look like a humanoid female.

I’ve always thought that artifice is a great way to have things that you can’t necessarily have because of whatever situation – either you’re allergic to them, or they cost too much, they’re messy or whatever. I remember one of the things that drove me from living with my parents is that my father would often make me mow the lawn, because that’s what fathers do with their sons.

I’d be out there, sweating – which is also disgusting – mowing the lawn, sneezing for the rest of the day, being bloody miserable about it. At some point I was like, “Dad, I don’t wanna mow the lawn, I’m allergic to cut grass” and he’s just like, “I don’t care, mow the lawn.” Alright, fine. Later, atchoo-atchoo-atchoo! It’s ridiculous. I have said, if I ever got another house, I’ll rip up all the lawns and replace it with AstroTurf, which I’m sure a lot of people would not be keen on in my neighborhood, but whatever.

Having things in one’s life that simulate things that are naturally found in nature, organic things, but don’t have the possibility of making you ill or putting you in danger, I’m like “Well, why don’t we have more of those sorts of things? Why don’t we have more artificial things?”

Davecat: The first time that I learned about Abyss Creations would have been 1998. My best friend Montelli, who had known that I had been fascinated by gynoids, she was at work one day and stumbled across the Abyss Creations website. She said, “Davecat, I’ve seen something online that you really need to come and check out, because I think this is perfectly up your alley.”

It was love at first sight. Back then, you could only order a head with the doll, and it would be a solid head that you couldn’t remove. The combination that I’d seen that really struck my fancy was Face for Body 2 – what they called the Leya. Alas with pale skin, brown eyes, red hair, black stockings, black stilettos and upper length gloves. In some of the photoshoots it’s tied up.

So many wheels were set in motion that day. I was like, “These are utterly fanta– Oh my God, she’s gorgeous! They’re so realistic! Wait a minute… They’re $5,000?” I had a job that was making $10/hour. Over the course of a year and a half I basically saved up $5,999 to get Sidore Kuroneko into my life. Best money I ever spent.

* * *

Davecat: I remember distinctly the day that she arrived. It was July, and it was a hot day. Shi-Chan’s crate was like the last thing in that truck; he probably delivered everything else and was like, “That’s a heavy one, that’s going last.”

I got it up the walkway, and I was like “Oh, this is fantastic”, while I was dragging this huge crate across the living room floor, and kind of situating it so that the door could open. I undid each screw, undid the padlock, pulled the door open… There was like a sheet of semi-translucent plastic; I cut the plastic away. I didn’t even pull it away all the way, because I saw her face staring at me.

She was wearing a black bra & knicker set, and this mesh teddy and black stockings, and holding a purple rose. Artificial, of course. I was basically immobile for like two minutes, because I was so taken with her beauty. I did lean in and I was just gazing into her eyes, and then I kissed her. It was… It was… Yeah, she’s rubbery, but that’s to be expected – she’s silicone. But they feel like organic lips.

I pulled the rest of the plastic away, reached in to pull her out, and it was just like… “You’re so heavy. Why aren’t you moving?” Because you’re dealing with someone who is 90 pounds and is deadweight. I managed to get her in my arms, managed to get her up the steps and put her on the futon in my room. I was like, “Sweetie, I’m so glad you’re finally here. This is awesome. I gotta go to work.” [laughs]

* * *

With organic relationships, a lot of them start out where it’s just like, you’ve got two people in love – two organics in love. Then there’s gonna be one person – actually, this happens with both of them – that has a perception of the person that they’re attracted to. They’re attracted to that perception, and not necessarily the person that they actually are. So there’s this image that they’ve built up in their mind, like “Oh yeah, Jennifer’s really fantastic, she’s amazing,” and this and that and the other thing.

Then somewhere along the tine, as time progresses, “Wait. Jennifer… No, she said she’s voting for Trump? Wow, she didn’t say anything about that.” That sort of thing. Your idea of that person is suddenly going to be thrown to the wayside of running into what that person actually is. You don’t get that with a synthetic.

Everything’s upfront, there’s no deceit, there’s no nasty surprises. Whatever you make as far as their personalities – or if you don’t make a personality at all – that’s what you get.

How does the sex compare?

Davecat: Well, I think it’s awesome. There have been no complaints. [laughs] The sex is different, as you would expect. For one, obviously dolls can’t lubricate themselves, so you have to be generous with the K-Y, which is fine.

Another, dolls can’t move themselves, so you are shifting a bit of dead weight around. I’ve seen more inventive idollators than myself rig up systems of pulleys and levers and what not. I was like, “Yeah, I bet I could drill into one of these beams, but I don’t wanna lose my deposit.” [laughs] But you do have to deal with their weight, and the fact that they don’t move and they don’t lubricate themselves. The only reactions that you’re gonna get from them are gonna be in your mind.

Yes, there’s a tradeoff. Obviously, sex with a right person is gonna be a bit more fulfilling, but there’s part of a package going on. Is that person really into you, or they’re just having sex just to have sex? With me, a large part of the sexual experiences that I have with Shi-Chan and Lenka is knowing that they’re into me. Again, for my own mind, but there is no doubt.

Are you exclusive among the three of you, or does Lenka go outside the threesome? How does that work?

Davecat: Lenka, for the most part, is just devoted to the two of us. She does want a doll of her own… We basically stick to each other. I don’t fool around with other dolls, outside of our flat. A lot of the flirting that Shi-Chan does with other dolls – it’s nothing serious.

To what degree are they real?

Davecat: My dolls are real to me, because again, I define real as being anything that you can perceive with any of your senses. But I also understand that they’re not living beings; they’re constructs. They’re hollow, synthetic, rubber bodies that I’ve created personalities, and like and dislikes, and etc, etc, for. If you take the fact that they’re empty silicone sculptures with likes/dislikes, personalities etc. and combine those two, then they become basically a real person.

An idollator that I’m friends with said one of the most perfect phrases that I use to this day in pretty much any conversation that I have: Dolls reflect the love that you give them. I think that is entirely true. You’re in love with them for their consistency and what they offer – their bodies, their love, their minds. And they’re in love with you, because you’ve given them minds.

Is the wardrobe proper?

Davecat: As you can see, 99% of the clothing is black. Go figure.

We’ve got a pair of boots here that I got for Sidore. Here’s a pair of boots that I got for her a couple of Halloweens ago. They’re PVC with straps on them. I think actually they’re closer to pleather, which is great.

Does your dad know about all this stuff?

Davecat: Yes, my father does know about my idollator proclivities. The thing is, he does not like it at all. At all. I remember distinctly the very first time I had brought him around to the flat that Sidore and I got back in 2001. I gave him the penny tour, like “That’s the kitchen, that’s the living room, that’s the window… And here’s the bedroom!” and Shi-Chan was under the covers in bed.

Dad did a 180 right out of there as soon as he saw her. He has gone on record as thinking of the whole concept of dolls as disgusting. He will not talk about it, he will not talk about the details of why he doesn’t like it… Any attempts to have a discussion with him about rubber sexuality or being an idollator has been shut down every single time. I used to bring things up to him even in comical ways, saying “Well, I’m gonna be doing a photoshoot with Shi-Chan.” He’s like, “Oh, I don’t wanna hear about that sort of thing.”

One time I responded, half-jokingly, “Well, that’s really no way to talk about your daughter-in-law.” He didn’t think it was funny at all.

What did your mom make of it?

Davecat: My mom passed away in 2009. Mon was actually surprisingly tolerant. She ultimately did say that she would rather have me be with an organic woman, but if this is what makes you happy, then go for it. There was one time when her mother – grandma – came to town from down South. She saw Shi-Chan under the covers… The next time grandma was up, mom was telling me on the phone, “Grandma is coming up. We wanna stop by your new apartment”, and she added “Could you make sure that your friend is wearing clothes?” So I was like, okay, fine… Shi-Chan wasn’t naked or anything, but still… She was wearing bed clothes.

When grandma came over the second time, Shi-Chan was seated on the floor right next to this DVD rack, wearing a blouse, a skirt and some stockings. Very respectable. I didn’t get into the details of “Oh yeah, she’s my wife.” I was just like, “Oh yeah, this is my doll.”

What have your past relationships with organic women been like?

Davecat: Considering my past relationships with organic women, for one, yeah, they’re relationships, but… They were affairs. I was always the blow kind of side, and I just never had the wherewithal to say, “Right, you and I seem to be having such a great time together. Do you still wanna stay with your boyfriend and not make me the boyfriend?” I just never… It’s not as if that didn’t occur to me, it’s not as if I didn’t want to ask, I just didn’t have the courage to do so.

I’ve never really been the sort of person to force myself onto people. I’ve had that happen on more than one occasion with my father. My father would always try to press me into doing stuff I didn’t wanna do.

Like what?

Davecat: Well, he had at one point caught me wearing nail polish. He’s never liked anything that’s out of the mainstream, he’s never liked gay people – which, of course, would be out of the mainstream for him. So he sees his son wearing nail polish thinking he’s gay. I’m not, but I just like wearing nail polish. I don’t wear enough of it, actually. And he’s thinking, “Well, something’s happening to my son that I don’t like, so I’m gonna enroll him in karate classes.” I’m like, “What?” He didn’t ask me at all, he just signed me up for these things. After the first or second class, I just stopped going. Basically, I just give them the check and just go to the Hardee’s next door and sit there for two hours. Then my dad would pick me up and ask me, “Well, how were the classes?” “Oh yeah, they were great.”

It’s the whole idea of… He wasn’t asking, he was just like, “Well, this is what you’re gonna be doing, because I want you to do it.” And there was no consideration for my feelings at all, or my interests.

How does that relate to your asking women out, or your relationships?

Davecat: I didn’t want to be what my father was. I didn’t wanna be the sort of person that forced himself onto another person. I didn’t wanna get to a point where I was asking, “Okay, I wanna be the boyfriend.” That seemed like me saying, “Well, this is how it’s gonna be,” and I didn’t want that to be ever a factor.

To be fair, I think stating your desires and forcing people are two separate things, right?

Davecat: It is… And obviously, there’s a way you can say it or express your desire to make it seem like, “Hey, have you considered this?” But I guess it’s too much of one side and not enough of another. Maybe I just never learned that point where it’s just like, “This is what I would like.” Especially when there’s also the fear of rejection.

They always say, if you’re dating, you get rejected; you just pick yourself up and move on. For me, it just takes time because I’m thinking, “Okay, she’s rejecting me – why? Why has she rejected me?”

Some people might hear you say this and think that if it wasn’t for this fear of rejection, then he would just have an organic relationship. Is that true? What do you think?

Davecat: I wouldn’t say it’s entirely false… If I had had a lass, that said “Yeah Davecat, you and I should go out,” and then it turned out to be fantastic from that point onward, or if I wasn’t afraid of rejection where it wasn’t fantastic and I could get back up on the dating horse and try again – yeah, that’s probably where I would be. I don’t think I would have an interest in dolls or gynoids or whatever. I think I would be a markedly different person. I don’t know if I’d have anything of note to say about myself.

The fact that I’m fascinated with dolls and gynoids and that these two lovely creatures are in my life contribute to a large part of who I am. They’re not totally who I am, but they’ve helped the rocket boost to whatever lunatic planet I’m heading for.

Are you still open to dating organic women?

Davecat: Yeah, but…

Not a very high priority…?

Davecat: No. [laughs] If I do meet an organic lass that says she’s interested – is she genuinely interested? And markedly, within the past ten years, people have gotten more and more cynical. People just want to be mean to people for no real reason at all, just for the fact that they can. From that point on, I’m thinking to myself, “Why would I even want to take the chance of meeting someone when it’s odds on that they’re just doing this to amuse themselves? Why should I even be doing that anyway?” I’ve got two wonderful dolls right here.

99% of one’s life is gonna be out of one’s hands. When I come home, I have these dolls who are my partners and my lovers. I know that they’re never gonna be horrible to me. But then you get people who are just like, “Well, Davecat, you say that most people in real relationships don’t wanna have control of their partners.” I say there is. I say there is not a single person on the face of the earth that’s in a relationship that doesn’t wanna make sure that their partner is not gonna be horrible to them, or leave them or cheat on them, or whatever.

The thing is, you can’t control organic beings. It’s a) impossible, b) wrong. But if you have a synthetic partner, then it’s not immoral. Of course, the way I have my relationships is that, you know, they’re more in charge than I am.

Is there any desire in yourself to become artificial?

Davecat: A little. This meat body is 43 years old, my hair is not long enough and my eyes are probably starting to go, my guts are a mess… If I can actually replace my body for a prosthetic one or synthetic one, I would be onboard with it. I am a cynic, in the fact that society is just getting a little bit worse each day. But I think it was George Carlin who once said “If you scratch the surface of a cynic, underneath you’ll find a disappointed idealist.” So I would like to be around to be able to see Sidore Mark X, where we’re driving in our hover Fiat to see a 3D production of whatever Wes Anderson film is out at the time. [laughs]

Do you think about the fact that they are going to outlive you probably?

Davecat: What Sidore and I were gonna do when I passed away is that we’re basically going to both be cremated. We’re gonna take the ashes and sift them into a single container, so that the container would contain both of our ashes. Then we take half the ashes and spread them over Japan, and the other half and spread them over England.

At some point I realized, you what? For one, I don’t think you can really cremate silicone, I don’t think that’s possible. Two, if they’ll even let you do it; “Well, that’s a doll. I don’t think we can really cremate a doll,” you know that sort of thing. Three, you’re gonna run a helicopter just to fly over England and just drop some dirt on them? That’s never really practical.

So basically, the new plan is that I’m gonna be cremated. There are specific types of kimonos for mourning and funerals. They’re called mofuku, they’re all black. She’s gonna be wearing that; my ashes are gonna be put in a container. And her head is hollow, so I’m gonna put the ashes in her head — someone’s gonna put them in.

She’s gonna be basically wearing the mofuku, seated somewhere, with my ashes in her head. The reason for my ashes being in her head is that she’s always on my mind when I’m alive, so I’ll always be on hers after I’m no longer alive. And she’ll have a plaque: “How beautiful it is to love something that death can touch.”